D'Annunzio blames NRCC for tough story

North Carolina congressional candidate Tim D’Annunzio, already on the outs with national Republicans who doubt his general-election viability, is accusing the National Republican Congressional Committee and state Republicans of orchestrating a damaging newspaper article published about him over the weekend.

The story in The Charlotte Observer detailed court records from a 1995 child custody case involving D’Annunzio and highlighted the candidate’s alleged drug problems and past run-ins with the law. In the 1995 court case, D’Annunzio’s ex-wife testified that he told her he had located the Ark of the Covenant in Arizona, the paper reported, and a judge in a 1998 child support case called D’Annunzio a “self-described religious zealot.” In one case, a physician testified that D’Annunzio had admitted to having had a heroin problem and a criminal past.

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D’Annunzio spokeswoman Lauren Slepian declined to address the specific claims in the Observer report, blaming the NRCC and state GOP for the story and chalking it up to a clash of “the tea party versus the establishment.”

“They will go to any length, including delving into court records from 15 years ago, to keep the establishment in power,” she said.

D’Annunzio was one of the top two candidates in North Carolina’s May 4 primary for the House seat currently occupied by Democratic Rep. Larry Kissell. He took 36.8 percent of the vote and is now competing in a runoff election against former broadcaster Harold Johnson, who took 33.1 percent. Republican leaders in North Carolina and Washington have rallied behind Johnson’s campaign.

In an e-mail, NRCC spokesman Andy Seré did not comment on the D'Annunzio camp's accusation against the NRCC, but rejected any implication that Washington Republicans had ideological objections to his campaign.

“The issue isn’t his ideology,” Seré said of D’Annunzio, “it’s his long criminal record and the obvious electoral challenges it presents.”